New garden villages to be developed across England to help tackle housing shortage

We have all heard of garden cities, maybe even garden towns but this time the government is talking about garden villages.

With new plans revealed by the government to develop 14 new garden villages across England we take a look at what this means for the housing industry.

What is a garden village?

A garden village refers to a development of 1,500 to 10,000 homes whereas a garden town refers to developments of over 10,000 new homes.

Although there is no set model for a garden village they should be designed based on the following criteria:

Built to a high standard

Attractive and well-designed

Meet local housing needs in particular the needs of first time buyers

Developed as own separate space with community facilities

What is the purpose of a garden village?

The idea behind the garden village is to quash the concerns of local communities regarding these larger developments putting a strain on the local area.

They will aim to do this by creating their own community infrastructure with good transport links, GPs and schools which in turn will help to create new jobs and boost the local economy.

Where will the new garden villages be developed?

Long Marston in Stratford-upon-Avon

Oxfordshire Cotswolds

Deenethorpe in Northamptonshire

Culm in Devon

Welborne in Hampshire

West Carclaze in Cornwall

Dunton Hills in Essex

Spitalgate Heath in Lincolnshire

Halsnead in Merseyside

Longcross in Surrey

Bailrigg in Lancaster

Infinity Garden Village in Derbyshire

St Cuthberts in Cumbria

Handforth in Cheshire

In addition to this there are also plans to develop 3 new garden towns in:

Buckinghamshire (Aylesbury area)

Somerset (Taunton area)

Essex-Hertfordshire border (Harlow and Gilston

What support is available?

There will be £7.4m in funding available from the government of which £6m will be allocated to developing garden villages, the remaining £1.4m to develop another 3 garden towns.

This funding will be used to help speed up the development and prevent delays by investing in extra resources and expertise.

In addition to this developers would also have access to other funding programmes to help implement the infrastructure side of the project such as the £2.3bn Housing Infrastructure Fund.

Some of the current plans for garden towns have received objections from community groups with concerns over how such large developments will impact on the local area. So it will be interesting to see if these new garden villages take off and help provide some much needed homes in England.